This section is intended to introduce the reader to various aspects of art, which may be related to various aspects of the present invention that are described and/or claimed below. This discussion is believed to be helpful in providing the reader with background information to facilitate a better understanding of the various aspects of the present invention. Accordingly, it should be understood that these statements are to be read in this light, and not as admissions of prior art.
A gateway is a communication device that interfaces a first network, generally a local area network, to a second network, generally an IP based public network such as the Internet. Access to the Internet is provided by an Internet Service Provider, ISP, also called a network service provider, NSP. The ISP provides a public Internet address to the gateway. The gateway gets the public IP address from an ISP server located on the Internet with the Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol DHCP as defined in the IETF RFC 2131 (Internet Engineering Task Force—Request for Comments). The gateway generally comprises a DHCP server that is adapted to provide private IP addresses to devices on the local area network. The gateway also comprises a Network Address Port Translation NAPT router compliant with the IETF RFC 3022. This enables the local devices to access the Internet through the gateway using the global IP address. The Internet access is provided at the gateway side, whatever the device on the local area network.
If an end user wants to connect to Internet with more than one NSP, he needs more than one gateway, where each gateway connects with a different NSP, each NSP using a different IP subnet.